Thank You, and Good-Bye
by Abducted Dib
Summary: Birthdays can be tough. Especially when you lose somethign special. (MAJOR ZADR-hints. SLASH)


Disclaimer: I don't own Zim or Dib or Gaz or Membrane, but I do own the idea… I made up Dib's birthday, sorry Jhonen sama if it is wrong… 

Author's note: I was just having a downer day this morning… and I randomly got inspiration for a one-shot fic.. I would have added it into a fic that I have up already, but it wouldn't fit. 

Warning: There are three kinds of people…  
1st: Those that came in here by accident- I ask you to leave before you get into anything you aren't into.  
2nd- You LOVE ZADR and you just want more… -Then you may enter and be glorified….   
3rd- Those that don't know what ZADR is- For you, I say slash. Yaoi. Whatever you want to call it. Male/Male homosexuality. Don't like it? Don't read it. I ignore flamers. 

Now to begin… 

* * *

One Last Birthday Present: 

It was a cold December morning. Snow flurried down across the yards and abnormally quiet streets. Children start out the windows as they rushed to finish their breakfasts, longing to go out and play in the cool white blanket. 

One child in particular paid no means to finish his breakfast early. Instead, he took his time, staring into a bowl of room-temperature oatmeal, inhaling the scent of steamy raison and cinnamon. Instead of the happy smiles the other children wore, there was a distant frown… Painfully numb. 

His sister pushed herself from the table and walked into the living room. Only moments later came the explosion of sound brought only by Saturday morning cartoons. His face sank deeper into sadness. He stirred his oatmeal with a silver spoon… leaving only after he got too bored to sit any longer. 

He walked past his sister, not bothering to say good morning. She forgot him, why shouldn't he do the same for her? He reached over and pulled on his lined black trench-coat and a pair of black gloves before leaving the house. 

He walked along snow-covered sidewalks. Head down-cast and his arms crossed over his chest in attempts to keep a bit more heat in his body. 

December third. It wasn't such a special day…. Just like any other day… but it still hurt. It was like this every year. He'd wake up grinning, happy and excited. He'd run downstairs and make sure to talk to Gaz and his father… but every year was the same…. They forgot. Birthdays just aren't special when no one remembers. At least he could go bother Zim before… now he couldn't even go do that….. 

Zim had tried to go back out to space when he'd heard that the government was onto him. Dib only found this out after a week when the FBI came to question him. He'd denied everything they asked him, or course. It was no use if Zim wasn't there…. And now he was no where to be found. Dib even looked over at his old house…. Disappointed to find an empty alleyway… not wanting to believe anything that happened. It was all as if Zim had never existed…. 

Dib had heard on the news only a fay after the FBI Agent came to his house. They had founf an extra-terrestrial vehicle. They'd shot it down and found a malfunctioning robot. They said the explosion was so hot that the body disintegrated. 

Dib crawled over the heaps of snow-covered rubble. He shivered in convulsions, but he ignored it. If Zim was gone, he had no proof of his sanity. He had nothing to really live for. Zim had been the only alien that he'd ever meet. His life seemed so boring, so empty without the alien there to keep him busy. He had no one to spy on and destroy the devious plans of anymore. No one at all the remember his birthday. 

Dib dug around in the snow near the area Zim had lived only a month before. Today was the first day that he could bring himself to come here. Today was the day that he'd find the proof that he needed. Proof that Zim existed… and that his whole life wasn't all just a dream. 

It had been ten years since the day that he met Zim. It was surprising that he was already twenty, and still living with his father and sister. Ten years ago he would have been happy to see Zim leave Earth in peace. He would have been so proud to have driven the alien back so quickly. But not now. He'd grown so accustomed to Zim over the years they spent tormenting one another. He even began to respect Zim after five or so years of harassment. Zim had come to a planet that he had never seen before, all alone and he managed to go on every day. He didn't care if people hated him or not… Din wasn't that strong though… and he knew it. He had to have some sort of acceptance or he couldn't face the world. For the past ten yearsm Zim had been all the acceptance that he needed to go on. 

What surprised Dib the most was the incident five years ago. He'd gone out to take a walk like he did today. It was all the same as this morning, except he couldn't control his tears way back then. He felt so alive and he felt the strain of emotion back then. Not to mention Zim was there. Zim had confronted hima s soon as he came close to the base. At that time, he hadn't known that the look in Zim's eyes was worry. All he knew was that Zim had asked him what was wrong, and that he didn't answer. When he didn't, Zim glared in his normal way, and that's when the alien surprised him. "I remembered," he said, "I know humans are stupid if they don't even remember when the ones close to them were born." And then he left. That was the closest thing Dib had heard to "Happy Birthday" since he'd lost his mother… ever since then, every year, Zim would tell him "Happy Birthday?" in some way or another. IT seemed to take away the pain of being forgotten by his family. 

Now Dib was alone again. No one would remember. But, he wouldn't cry. Not this time. It couldn't break through the numbness in his heart. 

What hurt him most about Zim leaving was because it was so sudden. Zim didn't even tell him that he was going. He just left. Not a single chance to say good-bye. He left him alone on a planet where he was unwanted. Dib wanted to hate Zim for it. He even thought that he hated him for it… until he cried. He cried for the first time in five years, until he felt numb. He knew that he couldn't hate Zim. He couldn't cry for someone that he hated. He couldn't hate the only one that ever accepted him as more than just another person. He couldn't bring himself to ever hate the only one that ever wanted and needed him. 

He had been there for Zim when he was hurt. He'd seen the sadness and devastation in the large magenta-coloured eyes. He'd witnessed the tears that fell freely down lime-green cheeks. He'd listened when Zim vented out all his sadness and anger and feelings of abandonment when he had heard that his Tallests exiled him to Earth. He was there when Zim needed someone to love him, and he had loved him for five years. But now, when he needed someone to love him.. Zim was gone. And he was alone. 

Dib threw a random bit of piping that he had found towards the brick walls of the house next door. He dug through that snow until his hands went as numb as his soul. HE stood up to leave… then something shimmered and caught his eyes. When he bent down to pick it up, he felt his own walls shatter like glass as wetness found it's way to the previously thought of as dry eyes. He picked up the metal frame and looked at it. 

Inside was a picture…. It was the only picture that he had ever been in with Zim. The picture was sideways, because Gir didn't know how to hold the camera quite right. He had an ice cream cone that had fallen onto his chest as if it was on cue. Zim was laughing.. they were happy then. Truly happy, only one year ago. 

When Dib left the abandoned base, he smiled slightly to himself… "Thank you, Zim. And... good-bye." 

* * *

Niko, you are my idol, and I just hope that my angst fic has made it's way into your views! Thank you for your support in my fanfiction. And thank you for inspiration of sadness…..   
ArmandLeg… Thank you as well, you always have a good thing to say to me, and you can give me constructive criticism… I appreciate all that you've been there for me in the past and in the future. 

If you are too sad and depressed right now, please email me at abducted_dib@hotmail.com and I will give you an alternative ending or something… or maybe IF I have enough inspiration I could write a prequel or sequel… but personally I think it stands well alone. 


End file.
